New Senate district likely

New census numbers expected to change district lines in Benton County

Wednesday, September 1, 2010

— Northwest Arkansas’ state senators will spend a lot of time in the near future studying maps.

A new state Senate district will be carved out of some part of Benton County, with a ripple affect reshaping other area districts as well, if data from the 2010 Census turns out as expected.

State legislators were briefed Aug. 24 on the likelihood of redistricting in their areas during a joint meeting of the House and Senate State Agencies and Governmental Affairs committees. Benton County is in line to add a Senate district because of an estimated growth rate of 47 percent over the last decade. Washington County grew by an estimated 26 percent, so some changes are likely there as well.

Sen. Bill Pritchard, R-Elkins, will be going through redistricting for the second time. Pritchard was in the state House of Representatives when legislative districts were redrawn after the 2000 census. Pritchard was serving on the House State Agencies and Governmental Affairs Committee, which was responsible for redrawing lines for U.S. congressional districts.

“We spent a lot of time looking at legislative boundaries as well,” Pritchard said.

Pritchard said legislators will probably start getting actual census numbers in February and begin drawing district lines in March or April. The decision on state legislative district boundaries will be made by the state’s Board of Apportionment, made up of the governor, attorney general and secretary of state. But, Pritchard said legislators will offer input too.

“House members, or anyone who’s interested in running for the Senate, will be watching,” he said.

Pritchard said he would have lost most of his House district in the initial draft of the 2001 redistricting.

“I lived out in the country and somebody seemed to think it’d be great for me to have all these rural areas. So they cut out all of my Fayetteville neighborhoods that I’d gone door-to-door in. I was upset with that,” he said.

Benton County Judge Dave Bisbee was in the Legislature in 2001. He said drawing Senate districts for Northwest Arkansas was pretty simple with just four districts.

“If you look at it, Benton County is split right down 540, split east and west,” Bisbee said. “Washington County is split north and south. What that did was give each of the four big cities their own district and‘their own’ senator. Rogers had a senator, Bentonville had a senator, Springdale had a senator and Fayetteville had a senator. That’s not going to work this time around.”

State Sen. Kim Hendren, R-Gravette, has seen Benton County’s legislative delegation grow over several decades. Hendren was first elected to the Senate in 1978 and has since served in both the state House and Senate. He was most recently elected to the Senate in 2000.

“In 1978, my district covered all of Benton County, which only had 50,000 people,” Hendren said. “It also took in half of Carroll County. I also had Tontitown and Bethel Heights.That same area will now have three or four senators.”

Sen. Sue Madison, DFayetteville, said her main concern is that too much politics will taint the process. Madison said observing precinct lines is important, as is taking into account the growth of Northwest Arkansas’ minority population.

“The lines need to make some sense,” Madison said. “It shouldn’t look like there’s an agenda going on.”

Hendren and Madison are serving their last terms in the Senate because of the state’s term limits law. Pritchard and Sen. CecileBledsoe, R-Rogers, will have the option to run again after the redistricting.

Bledsoe said she expects to run again and thinks that the core of the existing districts can be maintained.

“Maybe in the center of Benton County,” Bledsoe said when asked where she sees a new district being created. “They could take a few people out of my district and a little bit out of Kim Hendren’s district.”

All four legislators agreed politics will play some part in the process, although they differed on just how much.

“There’s too much politics involved,” Hendren said. “Way more than there ought to be.”

Pritchard said he’s prepared to work with the people who make the decisions, regardless of theirpolitical party label.

“We’ve got laws on the books about gerrymandering, minority-majority districts and other things so I don’t know that it’d be a problem. Being a Republican, it’s better from my standpoint if you have someone at the table. Last time we had Gov. Huckabee, this time I don’t know. But I’m not much of a conspiracy theorist. I’ve got a good working relationship with the attorney general, the governor and the secretary of state. I think they’ll listen and try to do what’s fair.”

News, Pages 13 on 09/01/2010